The Terminal
How many people actually go 2-3 hours before their flights? I've never been a believer in this. So this morning, I showed up a little more than 1 hour before my flight home to SF and there is such a long line for the customs. What the hell? Why is there so many damn people at YVR on a Monday morning. The line was longer than I've ever seen it...going almost to the end of the airport past the Alaska checkins and wrapped around more. It took about 1 1/2 hours to get through the customs lines and they didn't even care that we were going to miss our flights. My flight was at 7:10am and I was going to work after that...well so I thought. Candice and I finally thought that we were going to be camping out at YVR like in the Terminal. We finally got to the front of the line at 7:15am. Great! What are we suppose to do now...so we pass through customs, go through security and as we pass through security, some security asks us if we're on the SFO flight. They tell us to run! So there we are running to the last terminal in the airport (This is really hard considering I'm really out of shape). When we get there, the plane had already left a long time ago...stupid security guard!
So they rebook our flight for the 10:58am flight. Wow! Over 3 hours in YVR...how fun! The best part was when we found comfortable seats and watched all the other people running to try to catch their flights and thinking...they aren't going to make it. LOL. Then of course we try to nap...we finally get up around 10 to get some food since boarding wasn't till 10:30. So we get food, sit around talking and realize the Announcements are calling our flight to board. We look at our watch and realize it's 10:45...where did the time go? We start walking towards the terminal since the plane isn't scheduled to leave till 11. As we're walking, Candice's realizes that they are actually announcing our names over the PA for us to board immediately. We get waved down by the Alaska Clerk and finally are the last to board the plane. I would have just died if we missed out flight again!
That's it....no more Monday morning flights for me!!!
5 Comments:
Monday morning flights to the US from Vancouver are the worse. I've had to take that flight twice in the last 6 months and both times, the customs line went past the Duty Free shop into two separate lines that merged together. I thought I was going to miss my flight last time too, but luckily I was there 2 hours before so I made it in the nick of time. For US domestic flights, I generally go there an hour before at the most and I've never had a problem. - ceaz
I usually head there about 2 hours ahead, but only because I usually am doing the TN visa as well. Otherwise, I figure 90 minutes is plenty of time.
Reminds me of a time when we (two couples) were flying back from Mazatlan to Vancouver. We were WAY early for our flight, so we were just goofing off and playing around and generally killing time. Finally, we looked around at the crowd waiting for the plane, and something seemed wrong. We had expected the place to empty out when the plane was boarding (and would take that as our cue to do so as well), but forgot that there would be tons of people deplaning as well. So the airport terminal never emptied out! We were so stupid; kicking around for 2 hours in the terminal, only to be the last ones running to almost miss our flight.
Ah, how young and stupid we were!
my grandmother insists on arriving 2 hours early. i like it when the check-in agent tells me the gate hasn't closed yet, and walkie-talkie's my flight, then tells me to take my suitcase and all (no time to check it through) and haul ass to the gate. then again, that was pre-911 when security was a mere formality. it still is a formality, but they do act so serious. like making you drink out of your water bottle in front of them (maybe they think its kerosene inside?). ~ jason
Whoa, I've never had them make me drink my water out of my water bottle. And I usually carry two or three for the flight!
I even got flagged down for the take-your-shoes-off search, right by the gate; he asked me what was in the bottle (murky vanilla colour) and I told him it was my protein shake (which it was) and he took it at face value while we chatted about gyms and stuff.
They don't even bother asking me to turn on my phone / PDA / digital camera anymore. I guess I just don't look like a bad guy. :-)
I don't like public transit. I don't like sitting with the poor people. - TUNA
Post a Comment
<< Home